John Gray:

The collapse of the liberal order comes chiefly from overreach by American liberals. The charade in which Biden was ousted illustrates their fatal weakness. They believe their own legends. The Harris who campaigned for the presidency, less credible as a candidate than Biden, was a media simulacrum which evaporated on the night of the election. The Democrat insiders who invented the Harris facade, led by Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi, sealed the fate of the regime they sought to renew.

Perpetual wars were a big part of liberal overreach. The campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq were fiascos that destroyed public support for overseas military intervention, probably for a generation. For many who voted for him, Trump was an anti-war candidate. If he sticks to a realist, transactional foreign policy, it will avoid ruinous neoconservative crusades, but may also generate further conflict. He will surely seek vengeance against Iran for its apparent involvement in a plot to assassinate him. With Putin emboldened by a dirty peace in Ukraine, a wider European war becomes more likely. The Baltic states and Poland are actively preparing for such an eventuality. Whatever happens in Europe, Trump may not much care.

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